Event Season

While we have lots of great content in the paper this week, be sure not to breeze by the calendar, as the next week leading up to Easter is packed full of fun and informative community events April hits the ground running (for some of you literally) with the start of the Trail Society’s 30x30 challenge There’s still time to sign up, and even if you ’ re not officially taking part, 30 minutes spent outside each day is still going to pay off long-term

That same day is a poet talk with Jane Munro, and then Sunday you can get a start on garage sale season with local vendors at BICS Enjoy shopping for stuff at the school? Well you ’ re in luck as a Spring pop up market comes right back next Saturday

Growing families may be interested in a gathering with the Bowen Birth Collective next Wednesday, where all sorts of parenting aspects will be discussed. You can come back to the Library the next night for a screening of The New Corporation, a documentary which explores the role these massive companies have in today’s society - sure to get you thinking.

Want to know more about what our new mayor is up to? Well he likes to get out and about so there’s a good chance you ’ ve talked to him in town. But just in case, he’ll be speaking to the Rotary Club next Wednesday evening. As a past participant in this Speaker Series, I advise Andrew to prepare for some tough questions from the assembled Rotary members, such as whether he understands the rules of cricket or not

And, lots of good luck to a couple of Bowen teams who will be taking part in competitions this weekend! You may have already read about the three talented teens who are headed to Ontario for Ultimate Nationals (If not check out our front page), while back here at home Kelly Konno’s squads - the Bowen Adult Dance Team aka the ‘BAD Dancers’ , and the teen students in the Advanced Training Program will compete at the Shine Dance Festival in Burnaby We’ll have more on both of them next week!

There’s lots more in the calendar too, plus of course much more cool stuff Islanders always seem to be coming up with It is very exciting to see the sun out and events roaring to life as we fly through Spring and into the always exciting Summer season here on Bowen

And Don’t forget to watch out for April Fool’s on Saturday

- Alex Kurial, Editor

Letters To The Editor

I’ve spent several decades roaming the Roger Curtis property – long before the footprint of the current development and indeed long before most people dared to venture beyond the then-traditional walk to the lighthouse and into the exhilarating wilds of the south shore

That shore afforded a rare seaside solitude, all the while improbably contrasted to one of the largest cities in the nation standing, then so aloofly, in the distance It all seems rather dreamlike now on reflection - like so many other places, a quiet idyll no more

But of course it’s important to share such magic as remains in that place (and make no mistake it’s still richly endowed in that regard) but equally to recognize that the quality of that experience very much hinges on the measure of its exposure

The honorable objective of the proposed Metro park is to connect city dwellers with nature but there’s a balance in numbers to be met if truly communing with the natural world is to take precedence over merely meeting throngs of people with similar aspirations (campsites or not) Constraining all issues of popular tourism is a threshold beyond which it no longer enhances but instead depletes the object of its affection

There’s a price to pay for popularity and perhaps this conspicuously limited island has already crossed that line What more can we comfortably accommodate in our day-to-day for the sake of a park to share with so many others - however unique it may be or generous our inclination?

I have no answer to the agonising details of the conundrum as it stands but do know with certainty that preserving the natural gifts of this world - perhaps not always in the best but at least in some imaginable way - has become the richest and rarest of options in these rapacious times Or what else then will be left ?

- Jeremy Howe